Cruel Seduction (Dark Olympus, #5) (100)

Pandora raises a single brow. “This isn’t going to be one of those things where I move in with you and you suddenly expect monogamy, is it?”

“No.” I shake my head. “I meant it when I said I won’t try to shove you into a box. I can’t pretend there won’t be hiccups and missteps, but if you want to bring people back to the apartment—”

“No,” Theseus cuts in. “It’s a security risk.”

“If you want to bring people back to the apartment,” I talk over him, “then that’s more than fine. I want it to feel like home to you, whatever that means.”

Pandora snorts. “Theseus looks like he’s about to hog-tie me, so let’s table this discussion for later.”

“Deal.” The fact that there will be a later is still processing. I touch my bandage again. I’m alive. More than that, I have a future that I barely dared dream about. One I thought completely impossible for me.

Adonis slips back into the room and gives us a quick update. We’ll be here for a bit. Apparently stab wounds aren’t something you can just check out of a hospital with the same day you’re admitted…especially if they’re stomach wounds.

“Eris.”

I focus on Theseus. “Yes?”

“You don’t have to.” He looks markedly uncomfortable, which means he’s about to try to be sweet or comforting. “Resign, I mean. I can’t pretend I know your whole history, but you fought hard to get that title. You shouldn’t have to give it up.”

That’s the thing. It doesn’t feel like giving up anything. It feels like a release. “You said Minos made you feel like a weapon. My father did the same.” Gods, why is this so hard to say? “I’m done being a weapon for other people. I’m not going to pretend I won’t keep fighting for Olympus, but I…don’t want it to be this way. Or the way I was. I want something else. I want you. All of you.”

For the first time in my life, I want love.

Not power.

More, I can have it. With these three. Together.





ENJOY THIS SNEAK PEEK AT THE NEXT UNSPEAKABLY HOT BOOK IN THE DARK OLYMPUS SERIES, MIDNIGHT RUIN.





1


EURYDICE





The music is a deep, throbbing beat that seems to soak into every molecule of the room, inciting the occupants to sin. Or, if not inciting, then at least smoothing away any lingering worries about clinging to the perception of purity that the upper city values so highly.

We’re not in the upper city now.

I glance at my phone for the fifth time in ten minutes and curse under my breath when the text I’m waiting for finally comes through.

Ariadne: My dad put us on lockdown. I’m sorry, but I can’t come tonight.



I’ve spent three weeks and half a dozen failed attempts trying to get Ariadne into Hades’s kink club. Lying through my teeth about how no one will know who she is. Feeling guilty for coaxing her into what is essentially a trap when she shows all evidence of being a lovely person. That guilt has faded thanks to the events of the last month.

People are dying and the fault lies with the Vitalis family. With Ariadne’s family. Her father might be the one pulling the strings, but the little hints Ariadne gave Apollo at that house party six weeks ago weren’t enough. She knew this was coming and she didn’t warn us.

That makes her the enemy.

An enemy that’s not walking into my trap tonight. I sigh. Not that this is much of a trap, exactly. It’s more that I’ve been tasked with attempting to coax her over to our side. If that’s not possible, then I suspect someone will just flat out take her, but I’m the carrot in this situation.

Not that anyone knows it.

I look around, my guilt flaring for a completely different reason. I’ve been in my brother-in-law’s sex club half a dozen times in the last couple months. I have no doubts that Hades is aware of it, though I’m careful to only show up when I know he and Persephone won’t be presiding over the activities.

This is the first time I’ve come alone.

It feels weird not to have Charon as my ever-present shadow. He wouldn’t have approved of tonight’s activities, so I snuck out without telling anyone where I was going. The club manager, Hypnos, has seen me around enough now that the bouncers didn’t stop me when I walked through the door. Zir doesn’t know my arrangement with Charon, which works well enough for me. Charon initially allowed me access to the club, with one caveat: I’m only allowed to watch. He’s loosened up the rules a bit, but it’s hard to be comfortable indulging when he’s looking over my shoulder.

But Charon isn’t here right now.

The room is a true den of iniquity, all artfully designed to seduce the senses. The lights are always low when the club is open, but a cleverly hidden waterway around the edge of the room throws dizzying reflections onto the ceiling, giving the impression of us being underground. I’ve seen the furniture arranged in a dozen different ways, but tonight it’s the traditional layout with couches and chairs and cushions situated to allow plenty of space for conversation and, well, fucking.

I inhale the scent of sex and smooth my hands down my tight mini dress. My body thrums in response. It’s been…so long. I haven’t been with anyone since the events of last December, and somehow nine months have gone by. For a long time, I was focused on putting one foot in front of the other and not letting the pain of Orpheus’s betrayal break me.